Board of County Commissioners - Regular Meeting

Good morning. Welcome to the March 24 BOCC meeting. The clock in the room is five minutes slow, so we're going to follow the real time. We may need a battery. We'll put it in the budget and make sure that it's fixed for the next meeting. Noted. Morning, we're gonna start with the invocation and pledge of allegiance with Robert Bradley, Bread of Life Christian Church. Pastor, thank you for being here.

Let us pray. Return about our father, we thank you for today. Thank you for the gift that it is, our life, our health, and our strength. We thank you, heavenly father, for the reason whereby we're here today for this meeting, of this board of commissioners. As they set their hands and their hearts toward the betterment of this county.

We ask your blessings upon them that their decisions be guided by your spirit, that their hearts and their minds be guided by your spirit, and that the decisions that are made today be all for the betterment of the county and for your glory. We pray also for the employees of this county that daily work out the plan of this board. Heavenly father, we are moving right now in a season in this country where we're experiencing turbulence in this country. And, god, we're asking for your steady and calm hand to guide us through it. We pray for your divine protection over our men and women that are in the armed forces that are on the front lines of war.

And so, God, we ask you, Lord God, that you just continue to be with them, guide them, strengthen them. Be with us. Guide us. Strengthen us as a county, as a state, and as a nation. Our lives are in your hands for us to use us for your glory and for your honor. We ask your blessings upon all that we do today. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

It's the sound of It's

the sound of winning. Yes.

I love it.

It is the sound of winning. Forgot to tell you to silence your cell phones, and I forgot to silence mine. So please do so as we speak. We are going to start today with a resounding congratulations to the Lake Mary High School women's soccer team. They are the state champions. Chairman Lockhart is going to read that. And before she does, I just want to say from this seminal and greyhound mom, go Rams.

Commissioner Her gave me a promotion. I am still the Vice Chairman, just for the Oh,

did I call you Chairman?

Yeah, that's okay though.

Some days.

We're so glad that you all are here with us today. It is truly an honor for us as the Board of County Commissioners to be able to continually recognize student athletes in our community who excel. It's just really exciting and thrilling. And as a former school board member and a Lake Mary Ram former mom, I am really honored to be able to read this proclamation this morning. So I make the I move the following resolution, commissioners of the Seminole County Board of County Commissioners, recognizing the twenty five twenty six Lake Mary High School girls soccer team as FHSAA class seven a state champions.

Whereas Seminole County proudly recognizes the outstanding achievements of its student athletes and the positive representation they bring to the community through excellence and competition. And whereas the Lake Mary High School Rams girls soccer team achieved a historic milestone by winning the Florida High School Athletic Association class seven a state soccer championship in 2026, marking back to back state titles. And whereas the Rams secured their championship in a thrilling contest against Cypress Bay, winning by a final score of four to three in a dramatic match decided by penalty kicks. And whereas the Lake Mary High School soccer team overcame adversity and demonstrated resilience, determination, and composure under pressure, exemplifying the highest ideals of sportsmanship, teamwork, and competitive spirit. And whereas the team's success reflects the leadership of head coach Christian Isley, whose commitment to excellence, character development, and community pride has played a pivotal role in the program's historic achievement.

And whereas the championship reflects the dedication of the coaching staff, student athletes, families, school administrators, and supporters whose collective efforts contributed to this remarkable season. And whereas this remarkable achievement has brought significant recognition to Seminole County and serves as an inspiration to young athletes throughout the community to pursue excellence both on and off the field and is worthy of special recognition and commendation. Now therefore be it resolved that we, the Board of County Commissioners of Seminole County, Florida, do hereby congratulate the Lake Mary High School girls soccer team for winning the 2526 FHSAA class seven a state championship and extend sincere congratulations to the players, coaches, families, and supporters for their historic accomplishment adopted this March 2026.

Second. We have a motion and a second, commissioners. All those in favor? Aye. Hearing no, no in opposition. Congratulations, ladies. We are proud of you. If there's anyone from either the team or the coaches that would like to say a word, we would love to have you do that. You can take the podium. And I'd also like to recognize Board Member Abby Sanchez, who celebrates literally everything that happens here at Seminole County Public Schools.

And we are delighted to have her here. Everyone, you don't have to. That's good. We get a better shot of that baby.

Bring your latest recruit. Yes. Yes.

Well,

yeah, thank you for having us. It's it's obviously a very special achievement that these girls have had, and I think for for me, it's very special to be a coach in this county. So I'm very grateful grateful for that. And just watching these girls grow as players and human beings has been really special and how they impact the community and the people around them. Care about each other is what sports is all about. So, you know, I'm I'm very proud not only for the accomplishments on the field, but certainly for how they carry themselves and represent the school and the county this program. So, hopefully, we can continue doing that for years to come. So appreciate you having us. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. We have a second proclamation to read, and then we'll come down and do pictures all at once. This one is a proclamation proclaiming April 2026, Water Conservation Month in Seminole County, and it will be read by Commissioner Constantine.

Thank you, madam chair. Since we are winning everything, it must be in the water, so let's conserve it. I move the proclamation of the Seminole County Board of County Commissioners proclaiming April 2026 water conservation month in Seminole County, whereas water is basic and essential need of every live living creature, and whereas the state of Florida, the water management districts, and Seminole County are working together to increase awareness about the importance of water conservation. And whereas Seminole County and the state of Florida have designated April, typically a dry month when water demands are most acute, water Florida's water conservation month to educate citizens about how they can save Florida's precious water reserves. And whereas Seminole County has always encouraged and supported water conservation through educational programs and special events, and whereas every business, industry, school, and citizen can make a difference when it comes to conserving water, thereby promoting a healthy economy and community, and whereas outdoor irrigation comprises a large portion of the water use.

And Seminole County will encourage citizens and businesses to focus on improving outdoor irrigation efficiency in support of water conservation efforts. Now, therefore, be it proclaimed that we, the board of county commissioners of Seminole County, Florida, do hereby proclaim April 2026 as water conservation month in Seminole County.

Second.

We have a motion and a second, commissioners. All those in favor? Aye. Motion passes unanimously. Let's head down to the floor for pictures. Thank you.

The last three months.

Yeah. Please do. Madam chair, commissioners, I'm Deirdre Erwin, the water conservation coordinator for the Central Florida Water Initiative with the St. Johns River Water Management District. That's a very long title.

Would like to thank you today for passing this proclamation. We are in our twenty eighth year of having water conservation proclamations in Florida. We've partnered with the American Water Works Association to put emphasis at this time of the year in the importance of water conservation. This year, in particular, we're considering the drought conditions that we're dealing with. So I really appreciate your efforts today, and hopefully, your constituents will follow suit and save water. Thank you.

Thank you. That

concludes the the constituents in Heathrow. You're all thinking it, so I just thought I'd say it out loud. Northwest, we refer to it as the Northwest corner of the county. Next up on the agenda is Scott McIntyre who will do our county investment report which will sound a lot like the last few months as Commissioner Zimbauer has pointed out. Scott is appearing with us virtually today. Scott?

Good morning. I'll I'll keep it brief because you guys are right. Things have things have pretty much looked the same. Job growth has slowed. Inflation has picked up. And, obviously, right now, we're talking about I'm sorry, advance the slide. Yes. And then one more slide after this. The Middle East is really driving things at this point in time, and most of the data that we're getting is suddenly very, very stale, just kind of to set the pick if if if you will, economic growth according to GDP was was 0.7% in the fourth quarter. So it sort of started out with a little less momentum going into the New Year.

Next slide please. This is non farm payroll growth. So we got a really bad number in February. Five of the last nine months have been negative payroll growth. A lot of that has to do with technology. A lot of that has to do with AI. A lot of that has to do with uncertainty. Overall, we don't need quite as many workers, but the Fed is certainly a little bit concerned about the labor market at this point. Normally, they might be in a position where they could cut. That's what we expected when the year began. But obviously what's going on in The Middle East is at least temporarily tied the Fed's hands. So next slide please. This is inflation. It's the same story here. Inflation had been moving lower.

We had core CPI at the lowest level since March 2021, the last time we saw core CPI. A lot of that has to do with shelter costs that are coming down. Right now, we're in a position where we all understand that elevated oil prices and by extension, elevated gasoline prices are going to flow through to the March CPI and the April CPI number. We're gonna see them quite a bit higher. Again, the idea that inflation is higher is gonna tie the Fed's hands for now, so we don't expect the Fed is gonna cut.

The earliest expected is at the July and the market doesn't expect that the Fed is going to even be able to cut this year. So this is all in a state of constant flux. So we take that with a grain of salt. Next slide please. This is the two year treasury note yield. I show this to you guys every time. It goes back one year. You can see that the yield on the two year treasury note has climbed significantly during the month of March. For a while, we've been at a pretty narrow trading range. This is shooting higher with the expectation, again, that the Fed is not going to be able to cut.

It also reflects inflation expectations, which which have have soared recently as a result of oil prices. Next slide, please. This is where yields are. Obviously, you can see that they're sharply higher since the last meeting and for reasons that I've already mentioned. The pool rates, which is where most of your liquidity sits at this point, are stable.

They will be stable because the Fed is not expected to cut nor they're expected to raise rates. So where your liquidity is, we no longer expect that that's going to to fall over the course of the next six months. Next slide please. So upcoming maturities, got a couple of them in April, not a whole lot. 20 odd million is coming due.

Recent transactions, a couple of palm terms, which in essence are are locked in longer pool yields, locked in at $3.65 and $3.79. The recommendation at this time is that the county is fully invested. There were this is a time when some money is being used, and this is a time when there wasn't a whole lot of securities positioned. That is going to change in the coming months. But as of this point in time, we do not recommend that county make any purchases during the month of March.

If anything, this allows for additional liquidity. Next slide, please. We'll come back to this. But as of the February 28, the average yield was just under 4%. For March it's going to be just under 4%.

It may be that the spending out of those liquidity buckets pushes the yield up just a little bit toward 4%. And slide please. And that three ninety nine compares well to the benchmarks that the county uses. And if we can go back a couple of slides to the recommendation, or the lack of recommendation as it were, and I'll ask one of you to Move read the

a motion to implement the recommendation of our financial advisor based on the current submitted report today and recommend the clerk implement the board's recommendations.

I have a motion. Is And a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Thank you, Scott. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Hearing none, it passes unanimously. Thank you for being here, Scott.

Thank you all. Have a good morning.

All right. We've come to the portion of the agenda that is the consent agenda. If you have any intentions speaking on the consent agenda, I would ask that you turn in a speaker's form to Mr. Kunz, who is sitting up here in the front. And with that, I'll ask the county manager, are there any additions, deletions, or modifications?

Thank you, Madam Chairman and Commissioners. Actually, couple changes. I would like to pull for discussions item nineteen and twenty. These are the arts funding agreements that the board has discussed recently. There has been some discussion regarding the budget for this.

So I just want to ensure that everyone is on the same page and the budget has not changed since you adopted the budget. And I'd like to have our director of economic development tourism, Mr. Guicuna present that if you want to do it. After the consent, I'll leave that up to you, Madam Chairman. Also, one other just to remind the board that we did have an add on to the agenda and that is item 24A and that is a good news item with four thirty four and Ronald Reagan DOT project that they are advancing on our request. So that is included in the consent agenda as well. And that's it.

Thank you. I do think we'll do the consent agenda first. Do we have any speaker forms?

No forms.

We have no speaker forms, so we get to skip the reading of the directions for public speaking. And I know that does disappoint you every time we do that. With that, I'll look for a motion.

I would have something to

Oh, I'm sorry. Commissioners, do you have anything to pull?

I'd like to pull 22. Alright.

Anything else? Alright. So that takes us to item four, five through eighteen, twenty one through 24 a, and I believe twenty five and twenty six. Commissioners, I'll look for a motion.

I'll try to pull this off. I'll move a motion to approve item four on the constitutional officers' consent, five through eighteen and twenty one through 26 less 23.

22.

22. I'm sorry. Less 22. 23 through 26 including 24 a, which was a walk on.

21 through 20 yes. 23. You got it. The way you said it. Yeah. 22. Yes. Second. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Hearing none, it passes unanimously. County manager, we'll go to item nineteen and twenty if you want to do that combined.

Yes. Thank you, madam chairman. I'll have again mister Guicuna from our economic development tourism office just explain that the budget has not changed.

Good morning, commissioners. For the record, Guy Cunha, director of economic development and tourism for Seminole County. This is our one slide just to recap going back to the arts presentation on January 27. This slide here on the table shows that the approved budget for fiscal year twenty twenty six for the arts program is $148,881.60. That is the combined $74,440.80 for Wayne Dench Performing Arts Center and the Seminole Cultural Arts Council of 74,440 and $440.80.

So the entire arts program, that total budget listed below. After the BCC meeting on January 27, The Wayne Dench Performing Arts Agreement has a scope solely for operations at $50,000 with a term that ends on 09/30/2026. That is item 19 on your agenda. And then item 20 on your agenda is the Seminole County Seminole Cultural Arts Council, my apologies on that, 50,000 for operations, and $48,881.6 for arts grant program. And that term also ends 09/30/2026.

So the grand total for the arts program in the Seminole County budget does not change from the previous meeting. It is still the total $148,881.60. In the agreements that you do have in front of you, the arts grant program, that $48,881.60, those funds cannot be used for salaries. I want to make sure we state that on the record. These agreements have gone through updates for administrative purposes solely.

We have not changed the core understanding of the agreement. When we did the updates, as we see from the last five years, these agreements have changed hands a couple of different times. So the intent of the up upgrades and updates are for transparency purposes and do not change the scope, term, or funding that was agreed upon on 01/27/2026.

Anything to add? That's it?

Nope. Yes.

Thank Commissioners, any discussion? Yes. I just want

to say thank you so much for being the tip of the spear. Whoever the county employee is who draws the straw to manage various contracts is usually the person who winds up getting beat up from both sides. And so I want to thank you publicly for your willingness to dig in and really make sure that this is set up for success for both of our organizations. I do want to say that because we have changed the way that we have distributed these grant funds many, many times over the years, personally speaking for myself, not for the board, I'm looking at this from a year to year basis and seeing how this year goes. We get to choose who we want to partner with even though we're using other people's money.

This is taxpayer dollars and when we entrust a private organization to disperse those for us, we're doing it on behalf of the citizens of Seminole County. So I will be on this like white on rice. This is very important to me. The arts are very important to me and I want to make sure that the funds are being spent in the way that we are supporting as many organizations and artists as possible in this community. So we're looking for great

partnership. Commissioner Zinbauer.

Thank you, madam chair. I sincerely appreciate the additional transparency terms and conditions and reporting that's in this contract. I will, however, say, as you know, I've requested all contracts through this division to be supplied to my office, and I've reviewed each and every one of those contracts. And I will say none of them have the oversight.

Most men don't notice the details.

Yeah, we usually don't. No. However, many of those contracts do not have the kind of oversight that is now in this contract. And as many of you know, I'm a big advocate of equal treatment under the law, so I would be looking for our staff. If this is the new road we're venturing down, that we certainly consider all the contracts start to resemble what we've now brought forth in this contract. So every contract is at least treated equally and fairly for those taxpayers' dollars for these type of scenarios. So that that would be my request.

Is that clear?

Yes, ma'am. And, yeah, and the commissioner Zembeier and I have discussed this.

So It must it must you must have because it so I'm going to ask for a little more. I need to be part of the discussion for all of us. Are you referring to contracts with regard to grants, contracts with regard

With our e mail that's handled through our economic development

economic development. Correct.

Yeah.

Yes. Okay. I just thought we should get that out.

Yes. Absolutely.

All right. Any other discussion? I I Commission Commission no? Come here. It's a yes or a no? It's a no?

No.

All right. I would just say that as we close this out, that we we had a really healthy discussion about this a month or two ago, and there was a lot of very clear direction given. And I think when Commissioner Lockhart says that she's going be paying attention, I think we're all going to be paying attention. And I think it's around following the direction of making sure that, quite frankly from my perspective, the ratio of things that benefit the community makes sense compared to the expense associated with the organization, simply not defendable in the way it was presented the last time. So with that, I'll call for a vote. All those in favor?

I make a motion for the approval

of nineteen Second.

I'm sorry. Hold on a minute.

I'll second the motion for approval of nineteen and twenty.

All right. There's a motion to approve nineteen and twenty, and there's a second by commissioner Dilawri. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Hearing none, it passes unanimously. All right. I think that brings us to item 22.

Yes.

Commissioner Lockhart? Well, I'm going to

bring this up as another good news item. I just wanted to draw to everyone's attention. This is the proportionate cost share of SunRail for, the Central Florida Funding Partners, and I want to, this is the projected. So the SunRail the Central Florida Commuter Rail Commission, that's a mouthful too, the SunRail Board, has not yet adopted the budget for the upcoming year, and this is coming to each of the funding partners as the tentative budget. And I just wanted to thank Tanya Lohrey who has joined us recently, who has an incredible historic knowledge of SunRail and has been working on our behalf with our partners at FDOT and with the other funding partners.

We saw an increase last year in our in the overall budget and in Seminole County's share. And this year, through a lot of good work and some good conversation, and I will give Tawny the credit for figuring this out for us, This is coming to the the region at essentially a a net neutral and no cost increase, and Seminole County's portion for next year is actually decreasing $260,656 so a decrease of 2.25%. That's remarkable in a time when everything is going up. Not to say that we won't see increases in the future as needs develop and evolve, but I just want to give a huge shout out to everyone who made that happen for our community and for our budget.

We appreciate that. I'll give a shout out to Darren for finding Tony.

Yes. Wonderful. Thank you.

Great work. We appreciate all of you. With that, any further discussion?

I make a motion to approve item 22.

Second.

All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Hearing none, it passes unanimously. Thank you. That takes us to our work session, utilities master plan final with the holistic water policy. We have Johnny Edwards, utility director, and Kim Orenberg, environmental services director. Maybe we don't have Kim. She's coming. Oh, there she is. Sorry about that, Kim. Take it away.

Alright. Good morning.

We've been waiting for this for a really long time.

Alright. The anticipation. So good morning, chairman and commissioners. We appreciate the opportunity to present today. I'm Johnny Edwards, the county utilities director.

Presenting with me will be Keely Carlton, the county's water policy program manager. And as you mentioned, this is our sixth, and final planned presentation related to the utilities master plan. But today, we wanted to include an update for the holistic water policy. That's the county's innovative policy created based on the board's vision to have county departments looking at water as a precious resource from all perspectives, not just utilities. And you may also recognize, Steve Riley from Jacobs Engineering, who was certainly the brain behind the master plan, and very integral part of creation of the holistic water policy available today to answer questions if needed.

So our agenda briefly, I'll talk about the purpose. Keely will address, the holistic water policy background and update the board on its implementation. Then I will talk about the utilities master plan, looking at previous work sessions, the contents of the master plan, and touch on a few highlights before we talk about next steps and requested BCC action. Alright. So the purpose today, we wanted, again, to provide the board with an update on the implementation of the holistic water policy, review some highlights of the utilities master plan, and then request BCC approval of the holistic water policy and the utilities master plan. And with that, I will turn it over to Keeley.

Right to the front. Alright.

So good morning, Madam Chair and Commissioners. I'm Keeley Carlton. I'm the Water Policy Program Manager here at Seminole County. Just to start off, I would like to, you know, thank you, the Board, for your continued support on our water resources in Seminole County. Today, we've already emphasized the importance of conservation of our water resources with a proclamation, and now we're here to stand to give a presentation on the long term strategies to protect the source and ensure our community's water related needs are met into the future.

In August 2024, our team was here to present the holistic water policy plan to the board. This plan is a key strategic priority of the county. It outlines solutions to water resource challenges by protecting limited water resources, enhancing our natural systems, and advancing community engagement by shifting perspectives on water management and viewing all water as one water. I do wanna point out though that there are many one water movements across the nation providing guidance on the collective management of water resources. However, in Seminole County, we've coined our own approach as the holistic water policy.

So what this means is there's roughly 40 projects, programs, or policies that intersect with many of our county departments, outside agencies, as well as our community to provide a successful outcome. So, on this slide, you'll see the five main goals that make up the holistic water policy. Those are enhanced water conservation, develop alternative water supplies, enhance watershed management, mitigate septic tank impacts, and implement water utility projects and programs. So it's under each of these goals that there are specific concepts that are going to guide the implementation of this robust plan. So kind of looking back, the idea of this policy began around 2021, 2022.

And then we brought forward the plan to the board and with Jacobs and county staff in August 2024. And then we moving into 2025, there are various foundational programs that have been kicked off such as the expansion of our water conservation program, the start of an internal water audit program, and the successful launch of the septic upgrade incentive program that I believe you guys heard in the last session of the master plan. So also to kind of recap the previous presentation from 2024, we made mention that stakeholder engagement was going to be one of our first assignments. At the direction and feedback of the board during that meeting, we also noted additional stakeholders to add to the list, to look at including these concepts probably into the comprehensive plan, the need for a financial roadmap, and then also to treat this plan as a living document and to keep it updated as we learn. So relationship building both internally and externally has been a priority focus since its kickoff.

Before us is a list of stakeholders that we have engaged. The form of engagement has been group meetings, one on ones, emails, presentations at workshops, and just organic conversations at collaborative events. So they haven't just been a one size fits all. We've been out there talking about this to everyone that wants to listen, and even if they don't. So the feedback has been positive, though.

And there has been relationships and ideas that have grown from each conversation, which is probably one of the most exciting parts of this process. Stakeholder engagement will continue to be a staple of the program and it's going to be ongoing forever. Next. I don't know if I pressed it too many times or if I'm okay. So, now for the fun part, we're going to move into the implementation highlights beginning with the enhanced water conservation goal.

Our water supply in Seminole County is received from the Floridan Aquifer System. As we know, this is a valuable groundwater source throughout the state. Water conservation of our current water supply can offset the time that we will need a new costly source. Water conservation, of our water supply is very important that roughly 50% of drinking water goes to lawns and landscapes across the state of Florida. So our team has been dedicated to increasing the awareness of long standing efforts that the county has already been doing, such as our water conservation ordinance.

This includes our watering irrigation guidelines and then also the enhancement of our irrigation evaluation program. Also, we have expanded our rebate incentive program for our Seminole County utility customers and this includes our HOAs. So we actually have had high water user HOAs come to us and request assistance for upgrading their irrigation systems. We've done a pilot program, so stay tuned on how that worked out. But that was kind of a little exciting tip that HOAs are actually now wanting to engage with us on these things.

We've begun strengthening relationships internally with all of the departments across the county, our cities, and our water management district. We also have worked to expand our outreach and education footprint by opening the gates to our water and wastewater treatment facilities to a lot more groups and also stepping in front of classrooms from elementary to college. And there's so much more I could go on and on, but we're not going to do that. This slide this one's kind of cool. So if you like data and are a nerd, water nerd like I am, so this slide is showing a graphic of a resident's water use.

It was determined that this resident was a high water user through our H2O software. They were offered an irrigation evaluation. That means we actually reached out to them and let them know like, Hey, you're probably using a little bit more water than your neighbors or than you should and we can reduce your consumption, we can reduce your bill. They participated. So if you can see on this graph, they're using upward seven fifty gallons a day.

So the one marker that you see right there with the number one on it, this is that when the intervention occurred, we sent out a contractor, they performed the irrigation evaluation, You can see their consumption dropped to well below two fifty gallons a day. So that is a success. This program alone in FY twenty five saved us around 56,000,000 gallons over the span of the year. So we intend to hit this one pretty heavy moving forward because it is successful and people love it. Next, the next goal is our mitigate septic tank impact highlight.

As I stated before, we successfully launched our septic upgrade incentive program. And since this slide was created, we have had more applications come in. We are now up to about 40 applications in total and the majority of those are in progress. The ones that didn't qualify were not in the priority focus area of the Wekiwa Springs, which is currently the area of focus for this incentive as part of meeting state requirements of nitrogen reduction within the sensitive regions of the state. And then moving on to our enhanced watershed management goal.

This goal focuses on the management of storm water, mitigation of flooding, and the preservation of our natural areas. There are various departments that obviously touch this goal, but however, our watershed management division has been actively enhancing education restoration efforts through our Serve program, working on new content for the Fertilize Florida campaign, which is now live, coordinating with internal departments. They have also kicked off the beginning stages of a water quality master plan, and they've also added additional MSB U Lakes to the program. So very successful teamwork over there as well. And then, these next two goals are develop alternative water supplies and implement water utility projects and programs, which are going to be wrapped into the utility's master plan.

So at this time, I'm going to pass it back to Johnny so he can walk us through those steps. But again, I do want to thank the board for your continued support. I want to thank our internal teams because, yes, I am up here presenting this, but it takes a village and our internal teams are just as excited to collaborate on things and that's actually very exciting to be a part of. And then also our external partners such as our community members, which I do see Ms. Gabby in the audience here. And she has been integral in, you know, walking me through some of this too because she's a long standing resident. And so I really just appreciate the collaborative effort all the way around. So thank you.

Thank you.

Kaylee, we appreciate you too.

All right. So back to just looking at the agenda to remind the board where we're at in the program. Now we're going to talk about the Utilities Master Plan. I wanted to start off

with Johnny, did you feel we needed to be reminded?

History is any age, it's education.

I'll read through this as expeditiously as possible. So I wanted to start off with reminding the Board about the previous work sessions that we've had in the series. Let's talk about demand projections, water supply and conservation, our treatment plants and transmission mains. Last year, we took a a pretty detailed look at a few of our specific assets. And then in January, we ran through the capital improvements plan work session.

I wanted to take a kind of a guided tour through the contents of the master plan. And with any 500 page document, an executive summary up front is greatly appreciated, so that's there. The first chapter is an introduction talking about the objectives of the master plan and the background of the utility. Chapter two takes a deeper dive, looking at the demands, how they're calculated both for potable water, and reclaimed water and the wastewater flows that we anticipate needing to manage. Looking at seasonal trends, daily, hourly trends, not only where we have these demands, but when and how much is needed.

So chapter three builds on those demands, and answers the questions of what is needed, to meet those demands. What are the the pumps, the tanks, the pipes, the processes, the engineered physical assets, that we need to meet the demands and the applicable standards? Chapter four, is a very in-depth regulatory review that touches on our consumptive use permit. This is a permit issued by the Saint Johns River Water Management District that limits how much we can pump out of the aquifer or surface water bodies. It talks about our drinking water requirements.

Wastewater treatment, what do we need to do, to comply with state standards in treating wastewater, to send it out, as reclaimed irrigation water. Several other, regulations, both federal and state, we have emergency response plans, recently completed an assessment based on the federal lead and copper rule to make sure that the country doesn't have another, occurrence like Flint, Michigan years ago. And we did a risk and resiliency assessment, to evaluate what are the threats, natural, technological, and other man made threats, and dangers to make sure that we are protecting our assets, our services, staff, and our customers. Chapters five through seven look at potable water or drinking water in in a few different perspectives. Five looks at the water sources.

How much water is out there? Where do we get it? And what might like what might that look like in the future? It also discusses the Central Florida Water Initiatives. And this is a coalition that has been meeting for years consisting of state agencies, Central Florida Utilities, environmental groups, and other stakeholders, talking, about management of water in Central Florida.

And we know CFWI has implemented rules that will further limit our consumptive use permit. Chapter six looks at water treatment. We have five potable water treatment plants and talks about those plants in detail. Also talks about our Yankee Lake surface water treatment plant, which is used to treat surface water to reclaim to augment our reclaimed irrigation system. Lastly, in chapter seven, we look at our water distribution system.

We have four, service areas that are connected to our water treatment plants and several connect consecutive systems that are connected to water treatment plants from our partnering, utilities, other utilities, in Central Florida. Chapters eight and nine, we take a a very in-depth look at wastewater treatment. We have two water reclamation facilities or, wastewater plants, in the northern part of the county. There's a detailed discussion of biosolids. This is the sludge, the leftovers from the wastewater treatment process, which we send to the county landfill for disposal, and we receive leachate from the county landfill, in exchange.

So there's a nice symbiosis going on there. There's a brief discussion of a potential future septage receiving facility at the Yankee Lake plant. And as you know, in the in the southern part of the county, we have partnering facilities where we send our collected wastewater treatment to their treatment plants. Chapter nine looks at the collection system, talking about our infrastructure assets, our hydraulic models that are used to design the pipes and pump stations, our inspection and maintenance programs used to make sure that those pipes and pumps are in good working order and, you know, to meet state requirements to minimize the potential of a sewage spill and overflow in our area. Finally, there's a brief discussion on septic tanks throughout the county.

Chapter 10, reclaimed water. How much is out there? What is available to us? How do we distribute reclaimed water throughout the county for irrigation? And what are the costs and benefits of expanding that system?

Chapter 11 looks closer at forecasting of needs through renewal and replacement of our assets to make sure that our systems remain in good working order. While there are some built in redundant systems within our utility, we want to avoid run to fail because we think our services are too important to fail. So, only preventive maintenance, but appropriately timed renewal and replacement reduces the potential for service disruption. Finally, chapter 12 is the capital improvement plans, which I see as the sum total of all the preceding chapters. And these are the capital maintenance R and R programs as well as the future projects needed to keep pace with future demands in our system and meet challenges of the future, growth leading to more demand, changing regulations, changing environment, and we want to keep evaluating those changes for cost effectiveness.

So that's a quick look through the chapters of the master plan, but I want to touch on some highlights, some themes throughout the master plan that I think are important to note. First of all, coordination. We coordinate with all the county departments in delivery of the services that we provide. And I just, mentioned a handful of them here. Environmental services from the holistic water policy as you see today to conservation to septic tanks and in a few weeks, the Citizens Academy.

We work closely with environmental services. Public works, we want to know each other's projects and plans, for the future, so that we can dig once for efficiency, and minimization of area disruption. Development services, we have an engineer and development review committee meetings, making sure that we are in touch with new development. We're reviewing proposed new developments, and we confer with development services about future growth. Fire department, fire chief Kenley tells me he likes water.

And and the fire hydrants and the sprinklers, system. So utilities owns and maintains the public fire hydrants in our service area. We help evaluate fire flow. And if we have a main break or other cause affecting a hydrant, we inform the fire department, promptly. Other utilities I'm sorry. Information technology. We have the SCADA system that we manage. This is a remote control system for monitoring and controlling our facilities. So we manage that, and IT manages the communication network, and we wanna coordinate. We do coordinate on updates and projects that improve that infrastructure and cybersecurity for our systems.

Other utilities, we have interlocal agreements with pretty much all the utilities in Seminole County, as well as Orlando, Orange County, and Snoqualmie. We're working currently to update all of those agreements. Other plans and documents, there are five pages of reference materials within the master plan. Can't put it all in the 500 page document, but there are a lot of other moving parts and studies that feed into the master plan. We often coordinate with regulatory agencies, notably the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the St.

Johns River Water Management District. Lastly, I wanted to talk about coordinating with program management. For us, program management is a team of consultants from CHA and Jacobs that work side by side with us on a daily basis on a wide variety of tasks. And I just want to name a few of the tasks here. They've helped us strengthen our regulatory compliance assurance.

With respect to capital projects, they've helped senior project managers help mentor some of our younger project managers, and they help support all of our project managers, frankly. They've also developed detailed project worksheets and schedules to help keep us on track and on budget. They've provided updates to our engineering manual and given technical support when we review designs for our projects as well as reviewing projects proposed by developers. We're launching utility wide key performance indicators this year. We're going to participate in the American Water Works Association benchmarking consortium, so that will help us compare metrics against other Central Florida utilities.

Finally, we have over three fifty pump stations on our system. Program management has helped us prioritize the R and R. If one of those stations goes down for any period of time, we could have a sewage spill and overflow. So it's important that we make sure these pump stations are in good working order. And we know that these results, just listing a few here, would not be possible without the support of program management, the county manager, and the board.

I wanted to touch on water supply. Seems like a theme for today with respect to conservation. We use words like growth, demand, and regulations to answer questions like, are we running out of water? It's kinda hard to say sitting on a peninsula a peninsula marked with lakes and rivers that we're running out of water. But the plan helps explain, that the more we use, the more difficult it is and the more expensive it is to meet drinking water standards.

Most of our wells are screened in the Upper Floridan aquifer. That is the cleanest water that we have available to us. And I don't want to turn this into science class, but, you know, we've the Central Florida Water Initiative has already told us that we've we're pumping enough. Too much, frankly, from the Upper Floridan aquifer, so a line in the sand has been drawn from 2025. We can't increase beyond what we pumped in 2025, and the water management district would actually tell us we need to roll the clocks back a little bit to avoid environmental problems with lakes, rivers, and streams, and wetlands.

So we look at alternate water supplies, like the Lower Floridan aquifer or surface water sources, and the bottom line on that is that they are more expensive, significantly more expensive to develop those sources than to stay in the Upper Floridan aquifer. And this is why conservation is so important. One of the reasons, frankly, that it is much more cost effective to conserve than it is to develop these alternate water supplies. Environmental protection, wastewater systems for us, we wastewater treatment provides a couple functions. One, it provides more reclaimed water that we can use for irrigation instead of potable water.

And two, it helps make sure that the wastewater doesn't get into the environment uncontrolled and risking harm to the environment. Lastly, being a public utility, everything we do is of service to our customers. We work hard to consistently provide high quality services. R and R programs are, frankly, the pillar one of the pillars of success that we see is providing quality service without interruption. Another pillar is making sure that our staff has the proper training, certification, and licensors.

And where appropriate, we use qualified contractors for services for our customers and to help make sure that we are good stewards of another resource that is limited, and that is public funds. We wanna strive to be cost effective in everything that we do. So what are the next steps? Conservation plan, Keely and the Water Policy Group want to continue with conservation plan recommendations of capital conservation projects. Utilities, beyond implementing the utilities master plan, we wanna work with a rate consultant to, one, update our capacity fees.

The CIP is the foundation for calculating these capacity fees for new connections to water and wastewater systems, and this is how development pays for development, through those fees. We also wanna take a look at our wholesale fees within our local agreement partners to make sure that they're transparent and appropriate. Lastly, we wanna update our tier structure to help keep, the cost for, the lowest tiers low, and encourage water conservation. So we talk about this master plan being a living document. It is a twenty year plan.

We get new information every day, but we scheduled updates to this plan every five years. CIP projects and funding are timed. And before pulling the trigger on a future project, we want to reevaluate. Our demands keep on par with projections. Is this the most cost effective project at the right time to meet those demands?

Have regulations changed, environmental conditions, or are there other considerations? And when propose our annual budget, we can highlight any changes from this document and the supporting reasons to keep the BCC up to date. So with that, this is our final slide. I want to turn it over to the board for discussion and request approval for staff to implement the holistic water policy and the Seminole County Utilities Master Plan.

Thank you.

Thank you both. That was exceptionally well done. Exceptionally well done.

If you don't mind, Madam Chairman, I would be remiss if I didn't put the exclamation point on this whole year process. When I became the county manager, when you all selected me three years ago, you this was one of the top priorities that you had given me is to update our our master plan. It hadn't been updated in quite some time, and I really want to commend Johnny Edwards, our director of utilities. He wasn't the director at the time. He just was Mikey, did everything over there, I call him.

He stepped up. Christian Swenson, our Assistant County Manager, supported Johnny a lot through this process, Kim Ornberg and Keeley and her team. Jacobs Engineering, I cannot thank them enough. I see DDA Menard in the back, along with Steve Riley. Thank you.

They were they stepped up and partnered with this as well as with CHA. This was a huge, big effort to go through. As you know, I've told the board and the staff sometimes is that, you know, you ask yourself sometimes what keeps you up at night, you know. This really one that kept me up at night is just because it wasn't complete and you all had we are well aware of that and you put that on my radar right when I got here. So I appreciate that was a gap and it has been filled and I am so excited to, as well as Mr. Edwards to present the master plan for adoption today. So thank you.

Commissioners, I'll turn it to you. Any comments?

I'm ready

to Mr. Zimbauer.

Ready to move for a motion.

So we're in work session right now.

We are in work session.

Okay. So we don't approve things in a work session. Okay. It's not on the agenda as an approval. It's on agenda for a work session.

But we can approve things in work sessions. We've done it before, and we've been Okay. Told multiple times through multiple attorneys that we can do it. So I'd like a yes from the current attorney that says we can do it.

I am fine with you approving this during a work session. Yes. It's a noticed item.

And I hope we can build a consensus, of course. Madam chair Yes. Yes. I I just want to tell you that in the years that I've been here, you know, this has been very, very important, especially the holistic water plan as well as the utility in bringing forth the consumption element the conservation element. A statistic I read a long, long time ago is that and I I was you know, you just never think of it.

There isn't any more water today than there was at the creation of Earth. It's just where it is and how it is and whether it's salt, whether it's, you know, polluted and everything. And so the the point that we have to make, and we did it with the conservation today and and everything, and and and I wanna commend page 10, Keely. That's amazing. Take that back to everybody and, you know, all along the Markham Woods Road that I represent.

Some others represent it, everybody. Look how much money you can save. We are light years ahead. We really are. And and the from where we started.

And Johnny, Kealy, Kim, everybody, Jacobs, I really appreciate it. We went from a observer to a leader in this, and I I and I truly appreciate the fact I wish we could get everybody on this consumption program because the fact of the matter is is that in Florida, we use so much more water than we need to irrigate, so much more fertilizer than we need to irrigate. People come from the North. They think they've gotta do what they did in Ohio. Well, they don't.

And so to to educate and train, this this is tremendous. And to combine these two, I think, is is amazing. So congratulations to everybody from the county manager on down. And and let now we have to, as it says, implement. We're at the end of the beginning, and we need to continue on.

Any other comments? Yes. Commissioner Lockhart?

I was struck at one point in on one of your slides, not that this hasn't occurred to me before, but it struck me again, that as we are trying so desperately and entities of the state are trying desperately to get the message out that water is not plentiful. That's the the nicest way of putting it. We have folks in other sections of the state organization, agencies that are looking at preempting our ability to be able to to conserve and be, what's the word I want to use good stewards of the resources that we have locally. Our resources here in Seminole and in this region are different than the resources in other parts of the state. The way that we have to protect them and access them is different than in other parts of the state.

It just it it struck me that while we are trying so hard to make sure that we are doing the right thing for our communities, that there are folks in other parts of the state and in other parts of the state organization that would seek to preempt our ability to do that. It just they are at such odds with one another. It is it's remarkable.

And yet not unusual. Any other comments? I think we had a half of a motion.

I'm prepared to make a motion. I move to approve staff to implement the holistic water policy in the Seminole County Utilities Master Plan with an annual update in the last meeting in March annually.

Meaning an informational update or an update to the plan? An informational

update. Concern is with The progress report. Yeah. Regulations at the state level that may come and the federal level that we should be aware of those. You know, 10,000 foot view, not that we need to take action, but just keep us updated. As it was stated, it's a living document. And I think that's important, and we understand that because when people look back on this five, ten years from now and say, well, this is what was said in the master plan in 2026, why has it changed? And we we can follow that along if we get those annual updates. So that would be my motion, madam chair.

Is there a second? Second. Alright. And I neglected to ask if we have any requests for public comment.

No request.

Thank you. Any further discussion? Before we move on, I actually do have a few comments. Number one, I would love to see from our public relations department, who is keenly paying attention back there, some success stories with the HOAs that we can share with the other HOAs, because that will actually create win win win. I think the consumer won, I think the community won, and I think the HOA wins when the neighbors have lower bills.

So it's a rare opportunity to do that. Some of the things in this policy that I thought were just fantastic is the concept of run to fail avoidance at all costs. We cannot be there. We cannot be like the communities that have done that. The coordination among departments is starkly different from when I got here to where it is now, which I think has everything to do with when you got here, not when I got here.

I didn't mean to say that like it was me, because it wasn't. Dig Once is a great example of that. We were digging multiple times, all the time, before. And then I think the overarching proactive nature of this is stunningly different from where we were before, and that is because of the coordination with all of the consultants and our team and the willingness to dig in and get us there. So with that, I will call for the vote. All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Hearing none, it passes unanimously. Congratulations to everyone Thank who was

you.

Alright. That takes us to our public hearing agenda. I'll look for a motion to accept proof of publication.

Move to accept. Second.

All those oppose I mean, all those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Hearing none, passes unanimously. Ex parte disclosure?

Madam chair, I have some emails that I'd like to submit. Send it to the clerk.

Thank you. Anyone else?

I have none. None.

I have none. Alright. This is the Chapman Road right away vacate, and this will be presented by Annie Silaway, our principal planner. And I will go to Kate Latour to talk to us about how to run this meeting.

Thank you, Madam Chair. While the Board welcomes comments from all persons with an interest in these proceedings, Florida law requires that the board's decision in quasi judicial actions be supported by competent substantial evidence presented to the board during the hearing on the application. Competent substantial evidence is evidence such as evidence as a reasonable mind would accept as adequate to support a conclusion. There must be a factual basis in the record to support opinion testimony from both expert and non expert witnesses. Persons presenting testimony may rely on factual information that they present, on information presented by county staff, or on information the applicant presented, or on factual information included in the county staff report to support their testimony.

All persons who present written materials to the board for consideration must ensure that a copy of such materials is provided to the clerk for inclusion in the board's record of the proceedings and the official meeting minutes. Madam Chair.

Thank you. We'll now hear from Annie Silouye.

Hi. Good morning. For the record, Annie Siloway with Development Services. The applicant, Shane Huskin, with Eclon Constructors has petitioned the county to vacate and abandon a portion of Chapman Road located approximately a quarter mile west of State Road 426. The portion of right of way subject to this vacate request is located along the south perimeter of Lot 50 and Lot 55, and the north perimeter of Lot 51 and Lot 54 of the Slavia Colony subdivision, as recorded in Plat Book two, page 71 of the public records of Seminole County, Florida.

The subject right of way is 30 feet wide and approximately 1,074 feet in length. If the vacate is approved, 15 feet will be allocated to the North property, and 15 feet will be allocated to the South property. However, owners of Lot 50 and Lot 55, FDOT, have decided to sell their vacated portion of the Chapman Road right of way to the owner of Lot 51 And 54, LG Development Corporation. As part of the private sale of the right of way vacate, FDOT will retain a perpetual easement with LG Development Corporations to ensure continued access to its existing stormwater ponds on Lot 50 And 55. The applicant has provided letters of no objection from all applicable utility companies, and Public Works has no objection to the requested vacate.

This request complies with the requirements of vacating a right of way under section 35.184 of the Seminole County Land Development Code in the authority of sections three thirty six point zero nine and three thirty six point ten of the Florida state statutes. Staff requests the board of county commissioners adopt the resolution vacating and abandoning a portion of public right of way known as Chapman Road in the Slavia Colony subdivision as recorded in Platte Book two, page 71 of the public records of Seminole County, Florida. And that concludes my presentation.

Thank you. Is the applicant here? Yes, they are. And would you like to speak?

You better hear for questions.

So I'll move.

The applicant is here for questions. Do we have any requests for public comment? We do not.

No request.

With that, I will turn it to the board. Commissioners DeLaury, this is your

Thank you, madam chair. I have a quick question. First of all, I support the vacate. The only question I have is on, Taft Street. Once we vacate this, I do see, as you clearly noted, the DOT reserves their right after they sell the property to get an easement in perpetuity. I understand that. But I just wanna make sure that Taft Street, there's full access to the partial on Taft Street, which is 2050. And you still don't see any issue with that at all?

I do not see an issue. Tetra Street will still be accessible.

There's no act there's no issue with accessing the property at 250 Taft Street? That's the property we spoke about?

To the north. Yes. There's no they can still gain access to that property to the north.

I just wanna make sure of that on the record. That's all.

Yes, sir.

K. Well, and for the record, are you referring to Tetra Street or Taft Street?

It's Tetra Street.

I'm sorry.

Okay. Thank you. That is throwing me off a little

bit. Chairman.

Yes, ma'am.

If I may, Nisa Borchert for the record. I just wanna point out too that there is two easements being given given to the county with this vacate. There will be an access drainage and utility easement over the vacated portion of Chapman Road. And there's an additional drainage easement to the south that the property owner is giving to the county too. So commissioner DeLaurie, any type of, you know, there will still be county access over that portion. So it shouldn't affect the Tetra Street The

county access wasn't the issue. The issue was the property owner to the north. Just wanted to make sure because at some point, they could come in for development. I just wanted to make sure that there is full access to their property. We're not removing that access. That's all.

Yes, sir. That's part of the criteria when we look at these vacates.

I understand that, but it wasn't noted. I just wanna make sure.

Sure. Absolutely.

Commissioner DeLaurie, are you prepared to make a motion?

Is there any other questions? Madam chair, I move to approve the adoption of the resolution vacating the abandoned portion of the right of way, public right of way known as Chapman Road in the Slavia Colonial Subdivision as recorded in plat book two, page 71 in public records in Summon County as submitted here today. Second.

I have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? All those in favor? Aye. Opposed? Hearing none. Passes unanimously. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you. All right. That takes us to

the county attorney report. Thank you, chairman. I have two quick

items for you. I wanted to give the board an update on litigation regarding fire station eleven, APM construction versus Seminole County, where APM is the plaintiff and the counter defendant. This has been in litigation since 2022 regarding construction defects at fire station eleven. We've been to mediation twice with this entity and the surety who's also involved in the litigation, and it was set for trial for June for this June. And recently, APM has filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy, so I wanted to let you know that.

We received the suggestion of bankruptcy filing in the circuit court, which means the county's proceedings against APM, at least in the circuit court, have to stop. We still have a claim, against the surety, so that part of the litigation and there's many pieces to this litigation also. That that piece will continue, and we're working with outside counsel to discuss our options with regard to what can happen with APM and the bankruptcy. So we we have options. We'll we'll know more later this week. So I just wanted to update the board on that. And then my other item is just wanted to let the board know I've been asked to serve on the board of directors for Florida Association of County Attorneys. So I will be commencing that role this year. Congratulations. Thank you.

And that concludes my report.

Great. That's awesome. That's awesome. Alright. Top that, county manager.

Oh, I can't top that. She's too smart. Just a couple of events, announcements that I would like to just inform the board about. You may or I'm sure you already know about these anyway, but just for the public. First, we're excited to welcome more than 200 elite firefighters from across the country for the All American Firefighter Challenge. You know, and training camp, this will take place April at Seminole State College. Residents are invited to attend the free family fun day event on April 4. So a lot of competitions. You'll be able to see emergency vehicle displays. So it's going to be a fun day.

I want to thank Seminole State College for partnering with us as well. On April 3, our animal services is partnering with UCF for, they call it the pups at the plex. It's with the UCF softball. They're going to help, you know, pets connect with their forever homes. And then on April 11, believe it or not, Redbug Lake Park will turn 50 years old. So, we will be having a five ks event that day. It's already been announced and it's publicized. It's going to be a fun family day at Red Bug Lake Park. And then lastly, just want to I know I sent this to the board, but just want to congratulate Joe LaFosso for being promoted up to our assistant county engineer position. Joe has been doing a tremendous, great, fabulous job for us.

So we appreciate you, Joe. So thank you.

Good work. Congratulations, Joe.

Or condolences, not sure what it is.

Mr. Zanbauer, I hear things are always fabulous in District 2.

They they they actually really are. And the good news is we do not have the emu running wild, unrestrained through the district. I attended the Lake Mary Comfort Inn Airport grand opening on March 12. It was well attended, sponsored by the good folks over at the chamber, and I think it's another asset that has come to bear for our sports complexes and those teams and families that will come to enjoy, you know, our sport outings. Of course, Seminole County State of Real Estate, I attended on March 19.

Commissioner Lockhart was there. I saw Commissioner Constantine. Constantine there as well for a brief in and out. So it was good to see everybody there that attended. Quick reminder, the chamber legislative update is March 26 for those who will attend. March 28 is the Orlando Halal Eats food trucks from 4PM to 7PM at seven eighty six Myrtle Street here in Sanford for those who want to go

out and get the food

truck events. OEP announcement. National Science Foundation has awarded $45,000,000 in new funding to the Florida Semiconductor Engine over the next three years. That's great news for the semiconductor industry here in the Central Florida region. Of course, down at Neo City is where a lot of those jobs are, but there's a lot of those jobs that people here in Seminole County are part of. So that's great news from an economic development standpoint. Outside of that, that's all I have, madam chair. Everything else is great.

Alright. That takes us to District 3, commissioner Constantine.

You don't forget my name today. Okay. Thank you very much. I just wanted to reiterate the fact that since the last meeting, the Regional Planning Council, East Central Florida Regional Planning Council awarded the county and our staff that was here today, Kim Wornburg and others, the Diamond Award. It was at their Diamond Awards in New Smyrna Beach.

Commissioner Lockhart and I were there, and it was really a wonderful event, and it's nice to be recognized for something that is so significant in the cleanup of the Little Wekiva. Also, did want to mention that the Greater Orlando Sports Commission had a luncheon at the doctor Phillips on March 20 for bringing in various Olympic events, preliminary Olympic events before the Los Angeles Olympics in '28. They would be done at the Camping World Stadium. Their BMX and and skateboarding and flag football, which is coming really big, and, of course, beach volleyball, which is really big, and, also, that climbing the wall thing that makes you look like you're Spider Man. But they would all be done at the Camping World Stadium.

Many of them would continue to train, and Guy was there also. And we were pushing some events for Seminole County to some groups that were there at our new indoor sports complex, potentially. So it was really nice to have them there. There was a lot of Olympic folks and a lot of Olympians that were there also. So I think we've got a very good shot pending politics, of course. The Olympics is not, if anything, political. So I wish the sports commission a great deal of luck. Also, the, leadership seminal board is going to have a joint meeting, with the council and the board of directors on tomorrow, twenty fifth. Yep. Tomorrow.

Also, Seminole County Uptown Arts Expo at Crane's Roost will be this weekend. Wonderful event, coming on the heels of the Winter Park Art Festival. On the thirty first, we have another meeting from the statewide council on opioid abatement. That will be, at Seminole County, know, Seminole County sheriff's office, but it will also be on Teams. The and, also, I just wanna just say that there's a couple of things I don't wanna take others people.

So the on the April 11, there is going to be, as you know, one of the greatest the best events we have every year in the spring is the, Springs concert. Last year, it moved to Crane's Roost to a great deal of success. It will be there again, with the Orlando Philharmonic, using the, I believe, the the Bless Bless The Eagles. They're going to be, celebrating the songs and the history, life lifetime achievement of the Eagles. For all those of the Jewish faith, congratual happy Passover starting at sunset on April 1, and happy Easter Sunday to all of you.

That was awesome. That's it. Commissioner Lockhart.

Lots of different things going on. It's spring. It is spring. It's the best time to be out and about

for sure. How am I sneezing and the mess?

I know. I think it's just as much the fires. It's a combination.

It's not good.

Commissioner Her just sneezed. It's such a dainty, petite little sneeze. No one probably hears that we're we're giving you up. So the leadership the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council Leadership Summit that commissioner Constantine referenced in New Smyrna Beach was a it was a great job. The planning council did did a fantastic job organizing it, brought in speakers literally from around the world.

However, closer to home, yours truly, not from around the world, was able to serve on a panel called Transport the Region, which focused on things that are happening in transportation, like what's coming next in Central Florida, and was honored to serve on that panel with secretary John Tyler from FDOT and Rusty Roberts, who's with the rail administration in Washington DC, and our own John Slott was our moderator. He did an excellent job. We're going be doing a debrief on the event and figure out was such a great there were so many things that people could grab nuggets on. It was unfortunate that we didn't have more folks from the private sector in the room to really focus on how important it is that those of us in the government group are working together hand in hand with the private sector. So I know we're going to be doing more reaching out to have more participation next year for that.

I did mention at our budget work session that we toured the Volusia County Medical Examiner Facility. Christian Swenson and Chad Wilski and Patty Rawlings and I went and spent many, many, many hours talking and touring, and very impressed with the work that Doctor. Folcher and his team are doing there. I did want to point out though in our submissions, we have a letter from Putnam County stating that they support our request to leave District five. And I feel like I need to reiterate again on the public record, we are not a part of District five.

We are district twenty four. We never combined with district five. We do not need permission to leave, and and stand up our own medical examiner facility. We are our own district. So whether they were just wanting to make sure that we knew that they were happy that we were leaving, or it was kind of like a here's your hat, what's your hurry kind of lever, we are still planning to be in alignment with our current agreement, which is that when the agreement ends in 2029, right now, we do not plan on renewing. And as you all know, we are moving forward with the plans of a new medical examiner facility.

Sup it was Sumter. You said

Sumter. Did I say Putnam?

Yes. Sumter.

Thank you.

My apologies to Putnam. Sumter.

You. What that Thank you for the clarification, Conacher.

Sorry. Sumter.

Because when I read it, I went,

Yeah. Well, I just there continues to be this there's like a cloud of of of lack of clarity. So I just feel like every time it comes up, I need to add a comment. So that's there's my comment again. Seminole State College had our many campus wide convocation, college wide convocation, which is where the entire school shuts down for the day.

We bring everyone from the team together, and it's a day of learning and looking at the future and plans for the upcoming year, and had some great speakers. And one of them was our very own, Ademir Dessenay, who presented on recycling in Seminole County and how it could be implemented even more efficiently at the college and things that people can do at home and at their workplace. So shout out to Ademir for doing a great job there. Thank you to everyone who pulled off the retreat and budget work session. It's a lot of work.

Well done. Good things accomplished. We attended the chamber's Professional Women's Luncheon a couple of weeks ago. Thank you to Highland for sponsoring a table. The room was packed down at the Hilton, and the guest speaker was Michelle Mikisch from the Central Florida Expressway Authority.

She did an absolutely amazing job. If you have never had the chance to get to know Michelle, she is about as genuine and smart and an amazing executive, and we are fortunate to have her here in this region. The state of real estate was a great event at the Lake Mary Event Center. I will say I'm going to pile on Commissioner Constantine because I just think it is remarkable. He does he has an amazing talent of saying hello to everyone on the way in and saying hello to everyone on the way out.

And I turned I was sitting next to Holly Kroll, the tax collector's wife, was sitting next to me. And we both turned and looked at each other at the same time and we said, that is truly a gift. How does he like, there's this entire conference going on. People and he's just hi ing and good bye ing, and it was it was amazing. We you you are a master at these events.

So there were I want to give kudos to everyone on our team who participated in the panel. You represented Seminole County so well, talking about the state of real estate and economic development and development and all of the things that are coming in Seminole County. And there were a couple of questions that I saw a couple of you kind of like, Oh my gosh, I know there are commissioners in the room. Do I really answer this question? Because the moderator actually said, I want you to answer honestly, right off the top of your head, what would you say is the one thing that you would fix in Seminole County? And I was like, oh, that's I mean, that's tough. That's putting someone on the spot for sure, and you all did a remarkable job. So congratulations. I will also say the five of us received kudos. On the way out, one of the realtors stopped me.

I had not met her before. And she said, I just wanna tell you, I watch you on TV. Oh. And I said, oh, no. I'm so sorry.

Poor thing.

I know. And she said, no. I just I tell everybody, if you just watch the meetings, you will know so much about what is going on in this community. And if you want to be involved and you want to be engaged, you have to watch the commission meetings to see how things really work. And she said, I love watching you all interact together. You get along and work together so well. And so I wanted to share that with you because that could not be said about this board in prior years. And so congratulations to all of us and to our accounting management team who have worked to help us all work together very well. It's really important. Our community sees it, and it's a good thing.

We talked about the SunRail budget. We'll see how this meeting goes on Thursday. Yeah. The late night additional trains for SunRail are being used very well. We have quite a few additional riders. Channel thirteen actually is doing a story on it. Tim and I took the train down to a show Friday night at the Wayne at the Doctor. Phillips. Had a great time. We were able to take the train back. It like, it's not the weekends. I know. As soon as I told someone, we we have to go down on a show, they were like, but it's not the weekend. Okay. I get it.

It's not the weekends yet. I know we want the weekends. But to be able to do that, in this community is a really cool thing, and we enjoyed it, and it was We were not the only people on the train. It was a very busy night, so glad to see that's happening. Of course, you all know we've got the chamber delegation meeting coming up at the Hilton in Altamont on the twenty sixth and the OEP leadership conference on the twenty seventh. And I cannot let today go by without telling you all it is National Cocktail Day. Yesterday

was National Puppy Day.

That was Wonderful. Puppies yesterday, martinis today. That's

all I have. Commissioner Glory.

Thank you, madam chair. First, I'd be remiss if I didn't congratulate the staff as well as the county manager and his leadership team, as well as yourself, madam chair, for putting on a phenomenal retreat a week or two ago. I thought the leadership there and the information was spot on, and I wanna thank everyone, including everyone that was there that worked hard on it. So thank you. At the MPO, we've been working very hard on putting together a report.

Staff has. It's not done yet regarding traffic calming devices in relationship to first responders. I know chief Kinley is involved in that as well. Once that gets finalized, I'll be more than happy to make sure that everyone gets a copy of it. It's interesting to hear other elected officials and how their cities or counties are not talking about this at all, and they want to put speed tables everywhere.

And so we've had to put a group together with DOT to take a look at this to understand what it actually does or doesn't do. So we'll make sure that everyone gets a copy of this as well. Next month is child abuse awareness month. So if you do wanna get involved, there'll pinwheels over by the sheriff station as well as the courthouse as well as kids house. And just wanna make sure everyone's aware of that. And Easter, as one of the commissioners constantly talked about, is April 5. Happy Easter to everyone because we won't be here we'll be back after that. That's the end of my report, madam chair.

Thank you. Commissioner Lockhart?

After the state of real estate event, one of the Altamonte Springs city commissioners, commissioner Torny, mentioned to me as he was about to take off on his ebike that he was very concerned about the county's potential conversations relating to putting ordinances in effect that impact the use of ebikes. He said that he believed that the city manager, mister Marks, was in touch with someone in our organization on that topic. Okay. So he just wanted to express his concern. He thinks that there are there is some happy medium.

There is some middle ground that we should be looking at and not just completely disbanding outlawing them or whatever it is that whatever it is that you all are doing Mhmm. He won't he don't want that.

Okay. Okay. There you go.

To have him be safe or punitive.

Whatever it is that he perceives that we all are Yes. Whatever. Let's break that out. Right. Right. Right. Know know that we're banning e bikes before

we get through your emails. I just

clarification, madam chair, because we have not discussed this publicly or or individually.

Which is why I wanted to say it so that you all knew that the perception from a colleague is that we are doing something. And I Okay. Frankly wasn't terribly sure I knew what it was we were doing because I'm not you and Probably doesn't. Or Frank.

Yeah. And if you want, I can just say two things of that. Yes, we have been in conversation, but I have been working with Commissioner Delaure with the MPO and we haven't we've and Ms. Latour can back me up on. We've never talked about banning e bikes. So

Never. Okay.

And madam chair, just since the MPO was mentioned, we don't have anything really at this point going on because it's been discussed in Tallahassee. We're waiting to see what they're doing in Tallahassee. Right.

Okay.

They will take lead and then it'll trickle down.

Fantastic. I would just point out that sooner rather than later with all the things that they are taking lead on on e bikes is important because there are close calls every day Every that I witness. It's crazy. It's crazy out there. Not that I'm a fan of banning them, but if you're on the road, you ought to follow the traffic rules on the road, and that's not happening.

And I think the big issue, and we'll talk about this at some point, if it's appropriate, is on our trails. Correct. That's that's what

the talking

about. Also the sidewalks. Yeah.

Trails, sidewalks, roads, four way stops, having a conference in the middle of the road. It's it's crazy. Children.

Yeah. My district has Children.

Complaints from the trail all the time. Winter Springs. Yep. Terrible.

Alright. So we So glad I brought it back up. I don't know that I'm that glad you brought it back up, but but we do need to at some point get this figured out for the community's sake. So as for District 5, we are continuing to work through the joint planning agreement with the City of Sanford. There have been several milestones that have been missed that our team has reported on, and Sanford's team has reported that we canceled a meeting.

So we are right back where we were, and we need to pull this thing back together. I think we canceled a meeting because there were several milestones that were missed, so we can't keep talking about the same milestones that don't happen. So I do think, Darrin, we need to reengage with Mr. Bonaparte. I did let him know that this was going on and that we really need to advance this ball.

Can I ask a question?

So in my briefing with staff about that topic, I asked if there would be an opportunity for us to perhaps send a letter or reach out to our counterparts because it it could be that the mayor and the commissioners are not aware that at the staff level things are not progressing.

I can speak to it if you'd like me to. NACIP

worker for the record.

So I think the meeting was canceled because we had said at the previous meeting, hey, we are going to meet with all the commissioners individually and determine how we should bring this amendment forth and the time frames, which we've all talked about and you all have had briefings. And answer. So we have that answer now and we have the amendment as drafted. And it will be coming to you to extend the JPA. And then you all will have a chance to discuss that.

So that's why it was canceled because we were having these meetings. So they'll start back up now that we have and once we get it on the agenda. As for and I believe that's been relayed to them. I'm not sure if Dagmarie's followed up because we just had our last briefing, think it was Friday, I believe. So that's where we're at in the process.

And Dagmarie and I had a conversation yesterday after she briefed me on all the briefings with you all, and it is scheduled to come back at your next board meeting. So we will relay that to the city. We just put it on hold until we had your briefings.

Thank you. And at the same time, milestones on that side have continued to be put aside for weight. And you'll we'll bring all of that up at the next time. But from my perspective, I don't know. I'm not feeling like we're getting to where you all think we're going to get with this. More work to happen on that. Agreed. Yep. So on the March 3, I moderated a panel of one. This was awkward.

I moderated David Johnson in talking about property taxes, which is a task that's really bigger than it should be. But I will give a shout out to Leadership Seminole for putting it on their agenda. I will give a shout out to them for getting a room full that it was at Seminole State in Heathrow in the atrium. It was packed. We were out the door, and it was a very engaged and knowledgeable audience.

And David always does a five star job. So thank you, David, for continuing to give the reality of that message in the community. Shout out, and this has already been done, but I have to say it, Board Retreat was very well done. You all did a fantastic job and we appreciate how productive that day was. On the eleventh, there was a PBS panel discussion on homelessness and affordable housing.

It was very well done and there were a lot of myths that were busted in that room, which I thought was very worthwhile. With regard to opioid abatement, there is a it's a company called Stage Cares, and it's an acronym, C A R E S. Don't ask me what it stands for. I did meet with them. They had some remarkable ability to measure the results of programs that we're paying for.

And I did pass the information on to Stacey Smithwick, with Darren's approval, to do a meeting with them to at least listen to them. They dashboard all of the results. We all know that I love the dashboard thing, but it's the measurement and they're measuring against standards. And this is a healthcare delivery program and it ought to be measured against evidence based standards and that's what they're doing. So just an FYI, it was just wildly interesting.

Commissioner Lockhart mentioned National Cocktail Day, and I did have that down. Today is a trifecta. It's National Cocktail Day, national chocolate covered raisin day, which we all know that commissioner Zimbauer will eat anything that's covered in

chocolate. And

it is national cheesesteak day. Oh. So just gonna say, pats and wit out, that's what you do if you're doing a cheesesteak today.

Be in pats this weekend.

Not Geno's. That's the new guy. And you gotta get it wit out because that is not real cheese. And a question for commissioner Lockhart. The only thing that I actually had on my board or or chair report was that letter from Sumter County. And my question is, do we would would you like us to respond in some kind way to clarify the record? I don't think it would hurt,

and I would copy the medical examiner board just so that I mean, thank Yep. If the board is agreeable, I think that would be wise.

Sure. You know, I think they were really trying to help.

I do too.

Yeah. I I I

It'll be a nice letter.

In their way, they were trying to help.

Yeah. That's how I read it as well. Supportive of the mission.

Yes. And I will say, their representative to the Board has been quite gracious. They had an administrator attend the meeting, one that I did not recognize, who also made a comment at the meeting something about us separating from District 5. And just the way that it was made, I felt like there's still some misunderstanding. So I I just don't think it would hurt to nicely thank them for their support and reiterate that we are District 24

still. All right. Will do. And with that, happy Easter, happy Passover, and I think that's meeting adjourned unless all

fixed not.

Have a public comment.

Hoskow? Yeah. Public comment. I I just wanna rebuttal.

Inconsistent for the day.

I was gonna rebuttals?

Yeah. Rebuttal from the two of you. I I want to kill I just wanted

yes. I do. I killed

it already.

I just wanted to say, all kidding aside, if

you

were a realtor in that room, Guy, Mike, Steve, you did a marvelous job. David Johnson Mhmm. Did a great job. And in my hellos and goodbyes

All beautiful.

Everybody what? Well, it was a

half an hour. Mean, come on.

Everybody before Colorado. Commented and complimented and said, you know, if they were going to live they live in most of them lived in Seminole. But if they were going to live somewhere in Florida, it was going to be Seminole County. So I think our guys did a great job. And as I said, I didn't wanna bring up anything that that you all were going to do in your own districts, but, madam chair, tomorrow you have and we all have the midway drainage improvement.

We do. And I think that is incredible because we've been working on this for years and years, and I'm looking forward to that groundbreaking ceremony. And being that it's cocktail and Philly cheesesteaks, since you're from Philadelphia, Today is a great day for you, but also the twenty eighth is gonna be a great day because it's two of your favorite things in Sanford, Paws and Pours or pints. So Paws

and Pints.

That's gonna be on the twenty eighth, Paws and Pints Craft Beer Festival in historic downtown Sanford.

Wonderful.

And now you have done.

We are clearly not in District 5, the best event announcers. We do a lot of other stuff really well, though. All right. Have skipped public comment consistently throughout today's entire meeting. Do we have any public comment to close out the meeting?

I have not received any

public comment.

Let's just act as though I knew that. With that, I shall adjourn the meeting. Thank you, guys.

Thank you.